


A Mirror of Possibility

by KrastBannert



Series: The Good, the Bad, and the Life in Between [11]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Azula (Avatar) Redemption, Flash Fic, Fluff, Fluff without Plot, Half-Siblings, Happy Azula (Avatar), I swear she's actually happy she's just Azula, Post-Canon, Prompt Fill, Sister-Sister Relationship, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-19 01:46:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 690
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29867280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KrastBannert/pseuds/KrastBannert
Summary: A little moment between Azula and Kiyi, prior to Azula's re-coronation as a Princess.-----Written for the 'mirror' prompt for Tumblr's Flash Fiction Friday.
Relationships: Azula & Kiyi (Avatar)
Series: The Good, the Bad, and the Life in Between [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1858354
Comments: 11
Kudos: 29





	A Mirror of Possibility

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Tumblr's Flash Fiction Friday 'mirror' prompt.

_"A sister is both your mirror - and your opposite." - Elizabeth Fishel_

-[-]-

"Come on, Zulie! Please? Pretty please!?"

She sighs deeply, rolls her eyes at her sister. She'd thought she'd always be able to ignore the girl's antics, resist those big bright gold eyes. But, two years on and on the eve of her re-coronation, here she is, completely at her sister's whims.

"Fine," she drawls, pats her lap." Up, parasite. And _behave_."

"Not a parasite," Kiyi grumbles, but she smiles as she hops up into Azula's lap. That Kiyi was willing to trust her so much - and that _she_ was willing to allow this in the first place - still amazes Azula. When they'd met, she'd been a tiny little thing, a little beanpole of a six-year-old. And Azula had _hated_ her, seen her as a _replacement_ , a mocking image of the girl their mother had tried to make her.

But two years of therapy could do wonders, it seemed, because now, even though she wasn't going to admit it anytime soon - or _ever_ , maybe - she truly liked the little girl. And, as Kiyi fidgets in her lap, talking incessantly about some boy she'd met at school and about the koala-sheep she'd seen on the way to the palace and about a new doll she'd gotten while Azula cards her fingers through her hair, she can't imagine what she'd without her little shadow.

She gently wraps her sister's hair in her favorite style and slides Kiyi's little crown into her hair.

"There," Azula says, giving the girl's topknot a little pat." A picture-perfect princess."

Kiyi giggles and reaches up to pat Azula's own topknot." Just like you!"

Azula snorts, but her chest warms all the same, and she can't do anything to resist the little blush that forms in her cheeks." Maybe in your dreams, parasite."

"But we already look like each other!" The little girl protests, tugging on Azula's shirt and pointing at the mirror.

The more Azula looks at them in the mirror, at Kiyi's wide smile and her thin frown, she realizes - her sister is right. They _do_ look alike. They have the same high cheekbones and arched eyebrows, their eyes burn the same amber gold, their hair is the same silky ebony. It’s impeccable, how close they are.

"Yeah," Azula eventually whispers, patting Kiyi on the shoulder." I guess we do."

Logically, she knows it’s probably just because they’re related. But at the same time, she can’t help but feel it's something more than that. Something…deeper, she thinks.

Because every day she sees Kiyi, it’s almost like looking into a mirror. She’s the same as Azula was at her age, and yet…she’s different. Kiyi is ambitious and intelligent and _clever_ , a pint-sized spitfire of a girl, but she’s…soft. Soft in a way that Azula never quite was. That she still isn’t, that she never will be. And it’s a relief, in a way. It’s comforting, to look in that mirror.

She can remember looking into a mirror once. She’d been younger, far younger – still a child, really – and all she’d been able to see was her failure. Azula had smashed that mirror into a thousand pieces.

But this mirror…it’s alive. And it’s growing, right in front of her, and perhaps she should be jealous. She is, in some ways – she’s jealous that Kiyi gets the childhood she never had, a childhood full of love and peace and hope. But at the same time, it makes her hopeful. Because mirrors, she’d been told once, don’t just show yourself, your reflection – sometimes, they can show _possibility_. And somehow, that’s what she sees reflected in the girl sitting in her lap.

She’d hated looking into mirrors for years, now, because all she could see was how she’d failed. First it had been her father that she’d failed, her father, and her nation. Then it had been her family and herself, and then the world.

But this mirror, she finds, this mirror in which she sees possibility, and hope, and a road that she hasn’t yet traveled, is one mirror she finds she doesn’t mind looking into.

**Author's Note:**

> I was _going_ to be spending today writing a siblings fic for a different fandom. Then I saw the prompt for Flash Fiction Friday on Tumblr, and this happened instead. So uh...yeah. It's a little rough, but it's been a long time since I wrote a flash fic. Hopefully you still enjoyed it! Let me know any thoughts in the comments, good or bad.
> 
> As always, if you want to see me spewing fandom nonsense, the occasional writing update, and a bunch of other random bullshit, my Tumblr is [@krastbannert](https://krastbannert.tumblr.com/).


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